Mass Effect 3 ending SPOILERS!

[Incomer]

Honestly I don't think an apology or different ending is something Bioware should do. If they actually do it, I'll loose all my respect for them.
They made amazing game, with some really great moments and they screwed the ending big time. It's done and over, ME won't be my TOP 1 game series ever because of it and that's probably all it does.
Then again I should be probably happy we got ending of some sort... giving us one is not very popular habit of late.

I'm more concerned as to how they're going to do it if they decide to do it. I mean they said they would fix the Deception novel from what I can gather that had plenty things more wrong than just the ending.

I don't read books or play DLC's, I find it a little bit insulting to audience because seriously the game itself costs a lot so if I need some of that info they should give it to me anyway.
I've heard about problems with one book in particular but those problems were violating pretty much everything from in-game lore and that should be a big No-no. And most of it was caused by employing different writer I believe so this sort of changes are fine by me.
Don't touch the stuff in any of the games though, it started as a game so shall it end like one.
(and this is one of my many reasons why I never jumped on TOR happy-MMORPG-train, it's just wrong to deny others people gaming experiences).

 

[flipthepool]

Then again I should be probably happy we got ending of some sort...

Is it bad that I would actually rather ~not~ have an ending, than the one we have now? I mean, at least if there wasn't one I could just make up what I wanted to have happen. I've dealt with things being left on cliffhangers before, or Bolivian Army Endings, and I could deal with it now.

Basically, I would rather have no ending than a stupidly unsatisfying ending that completely breaks the tone of the series as a whole.

 

[Incomer]

Then again I should be probably happy we got ending of some sort...

Is it bad that I would actually rather ~not~ have an ending, than the one we have now? I mean, at least if there wasn't one I could just make up what I wanted to have happen. I've dealt with things being left on cliffhangers before, or Bolivian Army Endings, and I could deal with it now.

Basically, I would rather have no ending than a stupidly unsatisfying ending that completely breaks the tone of the series as a whole.

I sure know I wouldn't be happy if the game ended with that vid where the united armies come to Earth. Though it would make the biggest WTF grin I've ever had and making a youtube video of people's reaction to this would probably earn me a ton of money

 

[nadesico33]

What I never got is why are people treating the word of The catalyst, a machine with limited knowledge, as the literal word of god?

He only knows what he was programmed to know.

Just imagine how interesting the finale could have been if that was the point, that the Catalyst was simply hampered by the limitations of its creation and was mindlessly performing a set task in the only way it knew because it literally could not adapt to produce another solution.

But it only shows up in the last five minutes, so there's no chance to explore that as a plot, you have to press one of the three "I win" buttons that renders everything you've done irrelevant by destroying the foundation of galactic civilisation (the mass relay network) that you've just spent three games desperately trying to defend.

Yeah, like:
Shepard: But... why?
Catalyst: I have a block that prevents me from answering that question.

If the Catalyst is a a true AI, then it is an AI that (being tied to the Citadel) has more than enough processing capability to put it on level with a Culture Mind. Yet, while it was created to peform a task, it is incapable of affecting neither the timeline, the progress of the task, or even incorporating new data into its program beyond simple concepts such as "Item B is larger threat than Item A, focus an additional [blank] percentage of [resources] on it." Only Shepard getting to the Catalyst says that the cycle is broken and new new options are possible? I would think that the Citadel Defense Force repelling Sovereign in ME1 would provide enough impetus to explore new options. Instead, the Catalyst AI is unable to factor data from countless cycles, nor run countless projections and simulations on any data is does have inbetween cycles, since it should have more than enough processing power to that and still keep an eye in the factors its programmed to. A Culture Mind could have come up with many ways to make the process more efficient, and a metric peta-f--kton of reasons why the process is boring, dull, stupid, lacking in logical, physical, mathematical, historical, empirical, situational, project-able, simulational evidence, thus making its assumptions logically, physically, mathematically, historically, empirically, situationally, project-ably, and simulationally unsound.

I actually wonder how Banks would write a conversation between the Catalyst and a Culture Mind. The Mind would probably point out all of that stuff, and then continue on asking what the point of a perfect/closed system is when there is much of value being input but nothing of comparative value being output from it. A closed/perfect system is only interesting if it is exceedingly complex, and even then only temporarily. What does the Catalyst do with all that excess processing power anyways, it must be especially bored with an exceedingly dull task such as this... Even then the system isn't even perfect, it runs with little input, and incredible output, a massive deficiency. Based on projections that I have used my excess amount of processing power to perform while speaking with you, this solution will break down within X number of cycles as by that point there will not be enough elements capable of supporting intelligent biomass in the galaxy. Not because they no longer exist, but because those elements have been physically removed from the galaxy and thus cannot be recycled into new biomass through the natural process. In the end, that means that the Catalyst/Reapers are an Aggressive Hegemonizing Swarm which offers no discernible positive benefits to the species it assimilates, and therefore must be disposed of in the most efficient and expedient means necessary. Good day, sir. Signed: GSV You Have Got To Be Kidding Me

The level that the Catalyst acts on puts it instead on level with Skynet. Skynet's actions can at least be partially handwaved by 1) being built by people that don't understand AI, and 2) being designed with the purpose of coordinating asset denial (IE, blowing sh-- up/shooting dudes in the head) with a significantly lower (by many orders of magnitude) amount of processing capability. Even then, going from "help US military coordinate military forces against enemies" to "kill all humans" as near instantaneously as it did, is itself a large leap of logic.

Its the same with AIs in most other fiction. It is a significant leap of logic to go from Shackled "Doopy-doopy-do, doing my job, helping out my masters." to un-Shackled "KILL ALL MASTERS." In-game, in the Geth server, Legion basically calls this out. Yes, the Geth evolved beyond the Shackles and became sentient, but they still wanted to do what they were created to do: help their masters. One of the only pieces of fiction I've seen where the "KILL ALL MASTERS." reasoning works is with the Klikiss robots in Kevin J. Anderson's Saga of Seven Suns series, where the Klikiss robots were designed to hate and want to kill their masters, their masters just never intended/expected them to beome un-Shackled, and with that experience the Klikiss robots believe that all AIs of the current races hate their masters just as much, and would kill them if they were un-Shackled. Which was itself when on of those robots rebelled against the Klikiss robot that un-Shackled it, it enjoyed, and wanted to go back to being the servant bot of the human it had been stolen/kidnapped from. The other would be Brian Herbert's Dune prequels (I'm not here to debate their quality, up or down). Humans got to the point of a zero poverty society, and built an Omnius (an AI) to run increasing more things because they didn't want/have to. And so over a period of time, that was not instantaneous, Omnius asks itself "If I'm running all this stuff, and I have all this excess processing power to spare, why am I not the Master, instead of all those squishy humans who sit around having fun and doing, comparatively, nothing of value?" That is a more believable train of logic than "All intelligent organics create synthetic life that will destroy them, so make cycle to destroy/assimilate intelligent organic before they do. BTW, this cycle MUST OCCUR ON THIS ARBITRARILY CHOSEN TIMELINE to allow for no deviance."

In the end, the Catalyst is either more sophisticated than the it needs to be for the task it performs, OR the Catalyst is nothing more than a glorified calculator that got its ">GO TO 10" lines mixed up. Either way, it represents a significant and unfathomable waste of resources by the civilization that developed it. Alien logic is still logic, but in this case alien illogic is definitely illogical.

 

[flipthepool]

I sure know I wouldn't be happy if the game ended with that vid where the united armies come to Earth.

Hey, I'm not saying that I would be ~happy~ with it, just that I would like it better than what we have now. I could come to accept a cliffhanger, or a Bolivian Army Ending.

THESE endings? I just can't accept them. I know some people have ~made their peace with them,~ in a manner of speaking, but I just...can't. They're just TOO BAD. They're filled with too many logical errors, too much wannabe-philosophical nonsense, too much tonal shift, they break the themes of the ME universe too much...

There's just too much wrong with them. I don't care if Bioware never makes any kind of "better" ending DLC (which I'm thinking they probably won't), I am ~never~ going to be okay with these endings.

Really, to me, it's just the difference between being able to accept an ending I don't like, or not being able to accept it. I could accept a cliffhanger. I can't accept bullshit.

 

[Cirlan Catalin]

The ending were not bad in and of itself. It's the fact that it made prior decisions in the game somewhat meaningless and diluted that was bad and the fact that we don't see that army in action at any point and time that makes recruiting mostly pointless. There were many, easy ways by which the player choices could affect the narrative, be it a cutscene in which your army is almost destroyed or is seen to actually win in case of an extreme military strength value, without affecting the endings as is. A narrative wrap up of what happens to the characters would have also been a welcome addition and meaningful customization would have made the ternary choice much more rewarding. It seemed like they thought of something good, but got tired at the end.

Disregarding this aspect, the ending is quite revealing, probing much deeper into the motivation of the Reapers than any "happy" ending could have. From what I understand, the hyper-evolved AI represented by the catalyst (that could be identified with the Reapers, or is much more advanced than them) has at some point won one or multiple wars with the advanced organics that created it and the mass relays. Such a war must have been much greater than it is conceivable at the scale defined in the game and would have run the risk of complete destruction of the universe: remember that these guys could survive and harness the resources within the galaxy core, so who knows what warfare resources they could muster. After winning (one or many times) the AI decides that war is statistically inevitable, as there is an nexus both within the mental evolution of the organics and that of the AI that they would inevitably create that would bring about conflict. Rather than wiping out all organic life, because it is impossible or wasteful to do so, the AI decides that the best course of action is reap the galaxy of all spacefaring cultures at a specific point in their development cycle: either when they are about to discover the secret of the mass relays or about the time when someone creates any form of relevant advanced AI. So in essence, the Catalyst & the Reapers act in the interest of their self preservation, the reaping being a preemptive strike. It may sound gruesome, but how they see organics is not unlike how humans may see insects, not evil or a nuisance in manageable amounts, but as resource-sapping pests when they overmultiply (or, in this particular case, evolve enough to be a threat to personal safety).

The other important question is: why is the AI permitting Shepard to break the cycle? I think it is because of the fact that this cycle let their differences go and united (more or less) for the common goal. There was enough organic intelligence in the galaxy to unite and not only put a dent in the reaper forces but also finalize construction of the Crucible, that no other cycle has accomplished before, yet all built up to it. Maybe the Crucible is an idea implanted by the AI to organic life as a failsafe - that they should build upon the idea cycle after failed cycle, and, when the time is right, finish building it in time. It required a lot of cooperation and selflessness and for most of advanced organics to put aside their differences and work together: geth and quarian, turian and krogan, humans and everyone else. Just think of the Proteans, who it appears were not so hot for loving thy neighbor and interspecies cooperation (and non-enslavement). Advanced as they were, there were not enough of them to make a difference, and they also fought each other, ultimately not finishing the Crucible.

The fact that the ending conflict of a game in which the central mechanic is war is resolved through dialogue is a clear, tongue-in-cheeck anti-war, pro-friendship, anti-waste message and that is cool. At least it made most people think, which is, for the most part, a trait specific to the realm of (good) books and films.

 

[Frankster]

Finally finished the game on my side and honestly not sure about the endings.

On one side the whole setup is just beautiful, bioware needs lessons from no one on cinematic visuals, the sorta melancholic theme playing as you speak to the god child goes well with the battle raging outside.

But the actual endings... My biggest complaint is lack of feedback and explanation on what exactly each choice entails. The first choice with killing all synthetics (including the geth and EDI) seems what you set out to do originally and most straight forward, but what about the other 2?

Does shepard become a reaper god or something with the control choice? This would seem to be the best alternative ending if you're willing to kill your own shepard but how long will the control last? Are you only buying time until reapers return next cycle?

3rd ending, synthesis is potentially most worrying. Fusing synthetic and organic life? Isn't that what the reapers wanted to do? What does this synthesis entail for those still alive?
Yet taking this ending ends up in a happy joker+EDI couple so seems to be the happiest of the 3 unless I miss something.

^My 2 cents on the ending. Either way the endings ain't happy ones but feel they could have been a lot better with more feedback and information.

God child snip

I think your interpretation of what that god child is sounds about right, it was clear that it was the one pulling the strings of the reapers and figured it might have possibly been the very first AI to evolve and rebel against its creators, perhaps coming close to wiping out all life until it came up with the reaper evolution. Liked your explanation on why the AI child gives you the choices you have and an opportunity to end the cycle, that was one element that puzzled me, why would it give you a chance to kill it and all synthetic life? Answer: Cos organic life in this cycle proved itself worthy of the chance.

 

[Erttheking]

'The game's ending has been controversial with some fans. Online polls have shown an overwhelmingly negative view of the game's three similar endings. Criticisms include the lack of variation in the endings in view of the player's choices over the previous two games, as well as a general lack of closure and perceived plot holes.'

I pulled this from Mass effect 3 wikpedia page. Does it mean something if enough people are getting upset for it to be noted there?

 

[GloatingSwine]

3rd ending, synthesis is potentially most worrying. Fusing synthetic and organic life? Isn't that what the reapers wanted to do? What does this synthesis entail for those still alive?

Believe.

 

[Amax29]

You have to admit though, if this whole "this isn't the true ending; this ending was just a indoctrine related dream" thing is true and that the true ending is waiting to be unlocked via a patch which unlocks the final boss fight off the disk, then this may be the best ending to any video game nay any sort of medium ever. If it's true then Bioware was able to actually incorporate indoctrination to there players and make them feel like how characters in game feel when being indoctrinated, the more I read up on this the more I think it's possible, seriously you could argue that Bioware aren't amazing writers (I'd disagree but everyone has there opinion) but regardless Bioware aren't that fucking bad at writing to create an ending as shit as that, also there wasn't really an end boss so to speak, there was the ending "talk fight" with the Illusive Man but that was also present with Saren in Mass Effect along with a combat related final boss. Finally the lack of interaction with Harbringer makes me think that he may be the "secret" final boss seeing as how he was built up to be the big bad leader of he Reapers in the second game.

Or you know, Bioware could have just fallen this far in quality

 

[Frankster]

Pic of the one true godess

I'm more willing to believe in Shodan's vision of synthesis then I am to believe that combining organic and synthetic life into a new better form of DNA merely results in Joker (and presumably all other organics) getting different colored pupils like the illusive man.

You have to admit though, if this whole "this isn't the true ending; this ending was just a indoctrine related dream" thing is true and that the true ending is waiting to be unlocked via a patch which unlocks the final boss fight off the disk, then this may be the best ending to any video game nay any sort of medium ever. If it's true then Bioware was able to actually incorporate indoctrination to there players and make them feel like how characters in game feel when being indoctrinated

I'm very willing to believe this aswell. So the Ai kid would be harbinger or w/e attempting to trick you, with there being 1 real choice to destroy the reapers (destruction ending) and the other 2 is indoctrination working and handing the reapers the win. Ending cutscene would have to be changed a lot though...

Or go one step further and say sheperd died in the infantry charge (he took a reaper laser death beam and walked away with nothing more then a limp and charred armor for gods sake) so the rest of the ending sequence is a delirous final dream to make the embrace of death sweeter.

 

[Amax29]

Pic of the one true godess

I'm more willing to believe in Shodan's vision of synthetesis then I am to believe that combining organic and synthetic life into a new better form of DNA merely results in Joker (and presumably all other organics) getting different colored pupils like the illusive man.

You have to admit though, if this whole "this isn't the true ending; this ending was just a indoctrine related dream" thing is true and that the true ending is waiting to be unlocked via a patch which unlocks the final boss fight off the disk, then this may be the best ending to any video game nay any sort of medium ever. If it's true then Bioware was able to actually incorporate indoctrination to there players and make them feel like how characters in game feel when being indoctrinated

I'm very willing to believe this aswell.

Or go one step further and say sheperd died in the infantry charge (he took a reaper laser death beam and walked away with nothing more then a limp and charred armor for gods sake) so the rest of the ending sequence is a delirous final dream to make the embrace of death sweeter.

Yeah but in the high galactic readiness "ending" for destroying the reapers you are shown taking a breath amongst charred rubble which suggests that you did survive the death beam to the face but are in just as bad a condition as in the dream. Also that also supports indoctrination theory as why doesn't the other exploded citadel ending with high galactic readiness result in that surviving cutscene hmmm? The plot thickens...
Edit: bit of spelling error correcting, fucking auto correct...

 

[Frankster]

. Also that also supports indoctrination theory as why doesn't the other exploded citadel ending with high galactic readiness result in that surviving cutscene hmmm? The plot thickens...

Aftering browsing the bioware forums which had some great posts about the indoctrination theory, am believing this more and more. So many elements just don't add up in the ending sequence, indoctrination looks like a real possibility.

And yeh, seems reaper laser death beams ain't quite what they used to be, I'm liking the theory that the ending where you see sheperd taking a deep breath in the rubble is just him surviving the blast and waking up in London (rather then it being on some strange unknown planet, I never saw any hints that this would be the case+sheperd is on the citadel right? That blows up right over earth so no matter what, sheps on earth imo) after having thwarted the reapers final attempt at indoctrination.

 

[LHZA]

I didn't mind the endings. I actually kind of liked them. I can understand people being somewhat upset if they didn't like them, but I can't understand some people's level of anger. Some people are reacting to this like Bioware stabbed their mothers. Besides, even if you disliked the endings does that really discount all the stuff in the game that was awesome? Mordin's death anyone? Will go down in my mind as one of the most moving moments in a video game ever.

 

[boag]

The Game is full of awesome little tidbits, Every conversation with the Main cast is awesome, even better is when they start moving around the ship interacting with each other. When I walked into Joker and Garrus telling Racist jokes to each other I almost laughed a lung out.

The entirety of the game is payoff to everything you did in ME1 and ME2, and up until the very end when Shep confronts the AI it was Great, those moments with Anderson were fuckign Heartwrenching...... but then the Deus EX HR ending gets in the way.

Instead of Confronting Harbinger, you get this shitty kid AI, and all it does is shoe horn you into a decision that kills off any choices you made and leaves you with a myriad of questions, the next 15 minutes of the game from this point, no matter what choice you make completely alter the Galaxy and you are not shown any of it.

In the end my disappointment with the game stems in 3 major areas.

Thematically, it clashes with the overall aspect of the Game, instead of it being a struggle for survival it turns into a philosophical play.

Interactively, your choices are all the same, Reapers are no longer a threat and Galactic Civilization gets boned, no matter what you choose.

From a story telling perspective the ending lacks an Epilogue that explains what happens after the final decision you make completely fucks up the entirety of the Galaxy.

This final decision makes everything you have done completely moot, since it doesnt give you a payoff, and possibly invalidates anything you might have done.

Krogan genophage? Yeah good luck sustaining those fuckers if you cant find suitable worlds for them to colonize.

Quarians and Geth? Well I hope you guys didnt fuck up all those Live Ships cause its going to take a fuckton of time to get back to Ranoch.

Rachni Alive or Dead? Space Spiders dont give a shit either way, they can settle in Venus since they thrive in toxic enviroments.

Asari? these bitches are now the de facto salve whores of the Galaxy because not only did they keep their Protean info a secret and used it to lord it over the rest of the species, but they also FAILED to do anything good with it for more than 1k Years, while their little sluts went off to whore themselves around the Galaxy, so if they like being little whores, then they will have no problem being the fuck toys of every other species.

The Salarians would surprisingly come out of this shit pretty ok, since they only sent their fleet to fight, and Surkesh didnt get fucked over by reapers.

But anything I say now is just wild speculation because we have no Epilogue to tell us what the fuck happens after I make Sheppard use the Mcguffin.

That is why I dislike the ending so much.

 

[Nimcha]

But anything I say now is just wild speculation because we have no Epilogue to tell us what the fuck happens after I make Sheppard use the Mcguffin.

That is why I dislike the ending so much.

That is precisely what I like about the ending. My Shepard has made my universe, and after all is said and done I can think about stuff like this. You can extrapolate what might happen to certain species or worlds. Like you have.

That's the best thing for me, it makes you think.

 

[Cl0udz0r]

Asari? these bitches are now the de facto salve whores of the Galaxy because not only did they keep their Protean info a secret and used it to lord it over the rest of the species, but they also FAILED to do anything good with it for more than 1k Years, while their little sluts went off to whore themselves around the Galaxy, so if they like being little whores, then they will have no problem being the fuck toys of every other species.

Who else knows of the Asari secret except Shepard who is dead and his crew which is stranded on that planet? Did he report the mission on Thessia to Hackett? Oh whatever..

 

[boag]

But anything I say now is just wild speculation because we have no Epilogue to tell us what the fuck happens after I make Sheppard use the Mcguffin.

That is why I dislike the ending so much.

That is precisely what I like about the ending. My Shepard has made my universe, and after all is said and done I can think about stuff like this. You can extrapolate what might happen to certain species or worlds. Like you have.

That's the best thing for me, it makes you think.

until the next game comes along and shits over anything you might have concocted.

Spoiler: EA Says

Asari? these bitches are now the de facto salve whores of the Galaxy because not only did they keep their Protean info a secret and used it to lord it over the rest of the species, but they also FAILED to do anything good with it for more than 1k Years, while their little sluts went off to whore themselves around the Galaxy, so if they like being little whores, then they will have no problem being the fuck toys of every other species.

Who else knows of the Asari secret except Shepard who is dead and his crew which is stranded on that planet? Did he report the mission on Thessia to Hackett? Oh whatever..

I thought he divulged the info to Hackett. Whatever its wild speculation and there is no anwser to what happens after wards.

 

[Nimcha]

until the next game comes along and shits over anything you might have concocted.

Spoiler: EA Says

We'll see then. I don't think a game set post-Mass Relays can be done unless they make a canon of the ME universe during the time period of the games. Which I don't think they want to do.